Mark Wilson

I ask you to photograph heat—maybe through subtleties like sweat and steam—and all of you pyromaniacs run for the matches and gasoline.

Winner: The Firestarter

So funny story... A friends sent me a link to this challenge on the 24th with the deadline on the 25th. It wasn't a lot of notice, but I knew what I wanted to do as soon as I saw it. While I was sitting at the pool strategizing with some friends we met and started talking with some random guy. Eventually I decided to ask this guy I just met less than an hour ago if he wanted to come to my place later, take his shirt off, and take some pictures holding fireballs. I'm sure he thought I was pretty weird, but it all worked out, and the pictures came out pretty cool... errr... I mean hot!

After bouncing a couple of ideas around we came up with this plan. We covered Styrofoam balls we got from the arts and craft section in lighter fluid, and put them on top of light stands. We then covered the model in baby oil and sprayed water on him to make him look sweaty. Next we placed a garment steamer directly behind him for that steam effect. He stood about four feet in front of the Styrofoam balls, and I had a ton of help positioning all the lights and stands while I directed where his hands should go. Once we got everything positioned we lit the balls and started shooting. I Had about 30 seconds before we had to put them out.

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I Shot with a light camera left pointing down on him with a grid and a light directly behind him to illuminate the steam. Canon 5DMKII + Canon 70-200mm f/2.8, ISO 125 | 148mm | f/9 | 1/160th sec
- Justin Thomas

Breakfast

I wanted to do something clever for this challenge, seeing how unless you were going to capture fire, just about anything you did would have to be metaphorical. It's been pretty hot here in southeastern Ohio, so I thought it would be neat to make it look like I had fried an egg on my driveway. Just before setting up that picture, I thought, maybe I should just do breakfast. I added the forks, toasted the bread and the sun helped melt the pat of butter. I took the photo with my white balance set to cloudy, but it still wasn't orange enough. I wanted it to look very hot, so I cropped it and brought the reds and oranges even higher. Then I tonemapped it to make the oranges more surreal and to haze out the grass in the background. Shot on my Canon T3i, at 18mm, 1/1600 sec at f/4.0, ISO 100.
- Jason Pyles

Campfire

Sitting around the campfire Friday night I recalled that there was a "Heat" photo challenge at Gizmodo, so I grabbed up my Olympus 8010 tough and hand-held a couple of shots of the fire in front us. The first shot was done with the built-in flash and the second shot was without flash. Stabilization was achieved by tying one of a string to a bolt that fits into the camera and the other end tied to a large steel washer; knelt on the washer and wrapped the excess string around my arm to take up the slack and tighten the string. The second shot was then over-laid on top of the first shot in my digital darkroom. F/5.9, 1/250 sec (w/built-in flash) ISO: 100
- Mark Davis

Washington Square Park

What better place to capture Heat than in New York. The city just gets on with living, regardless of temperature, even though roads melt and aircon units run on overdrive. I knew one place close to me that would certainly provide me with a great photo for this challenge.

I took a walk after work to Washington Square Park to watch New Yorkers cool off in the fountain. I captured people sitting in the water, playing in the fountain jets, and just letting the spray fall on their faces to cool off in the 98 degree heatwave.

My chosen shot encapsulates the heat of the day, as the sun was low in the sky. The warmth of the orange hue and the cooling sensation of the subjects in the fountain together just worked perfectly. I was shooting on my Canon 500D with a fixed 50mm Canon f1.8 lens which i find is great for capturing these moments, plus it meant i didn't have to get into the fountain with my camera to get the shot!
- Jon Darren

Wildfire

This is the High Park Wildfire that is currently burning west of Fort Collins, Colorado. The photo was taken during sunset from Lake Loveland in Loveland, Colorado. I believe this is day 15 of the fire and it has burned around 200 homes and 81,190 acres. If the fire isn't hot enough for you, this photo was taken on the hottest day of the year (so far) with temps just over 100 degrees. Photo information: taken June 23 at 9:04pm, Canon EOS 60D camera, Canon EF-S 55-250mm f/4-5.6 IS lens at 250mm, ISO 100, f/5.6, 1.3 seconds
- Logan Thomas

Dryer Hot Rods

It wasn't easy finding heat where I live considering our Summer has pretty much decided to never show up this year. Since I had to do laundry on Sunday and know how hot that laundromat can get, I decided to take my camera. After many attempts of trying to capture the steam on the windows or any other element suggesting heat, I turned around and noticed I was missing the hottest object in the room: the dryers. I set my camera on shutter priority, sat it against a chair, got past the questions of the weirded out people around me and shot away. Canon 5D - ISO 200 - f/5.0 - 1/10s
- Ben Lanon

Coney Island

On Saturday the 30th annual Mermaid Parade was held at Coney Island in New York. While most of those images are NSFW, I decided to look for something to represent how damn hot it was that day with the Giz challenge in mind. I actually burned my backside sitting on the pavement inside the barriers during the parade (it is still red today). I couldn't take it anymore and moved over to the beach to try and get some relief. I haven't seen Coney Island this crowded before, and there was not relief to be had (unless you are brave enough to swim in the water). I wanted to capture the heat lines and capture the least amount of water possible to help reinforce the notion of heat. On the way back to the parade I saw a dude in a bunny costume in the back of a NYPD golf cart passed out from heat exhaustion. This was shot with a Nikon D300s and a 70-300mm variable zoom lens. f 5.3, 1/1250, ISO100
- Mike Ratliff

Big Sun

This is a picture of the sun in Phoenix, AZ. I like the transition between orange around the sun to purple, the two main colors of the home basketball team. Nikon D3000 – f/7.1 – 1/1250 sec. – ISO-100
- Spencer Lund

Sad Child

A few years ago we accidentally left a crayon out on our deck in the sweltering summer heat - the result made for an interesting photo. So with the current challenge of "heat" and a timely heatwave this weekend, I remembered this event and sacrificed another crayon for a photo. It took maybe only 2 hours for the red crayon to go from solid to liquidy wax in our 90+ degree heat. For some reason the yellow crayon didn't suffer as badly...Canon 60D ISO 400, f/6.3, 270 mm, 1/640
- Cheryl MacLean

The Attack

I was shooting with a 7D using a 70-200 f2.8 and two strobes connected to pocket wizard-iii's. ISO 200, f11 & Shutter Speed of 200.

Bought the dinosaur and helicopter from walmart for a couple bucks. The flames are from an aerosol can of silicone, with the straw running through the t-rex's mouth. My friend hid behind the scene and lit the silicone. The choppa was hung from the rafters of my garage with fishing line.
- Ian Chase

I picture this week's victor, Justin Thomas, clutching an imaginary trophy over a pile of blackened rubble that was once his garage. A wisp of charcoal colored smoke leaves his mouth as he coughs. And as his insurance agent pulls up to the scene, Justin really hopes that he's the only one in his town who reads Gizmodo. See the big shots on flickr.